In celebration of the new Jihad Watch website design (and with heartfelt thanks to Marc, my ace tech expert, who made it all happen), and in recognition of the fact that we now have, for the first time in a very long time, a glitch-free comment section, it is time for an open forum of sorts. Not long ago, I received this email from journalist Andrew Burt, asking for an interview:
Dear Mr. Spencer,
My name is Andrew Burt, and I am a journalist and a third-year student at Yale Law School. I am writing a book on the history of political extremism in the United States, and was hoping I could speak to you for a recorded interview of 30 minutes sometime this week or next. I am hoping that you can help explain to me your views on the Muslim Brotherhood in America, in particular its connection to the Khalil Gibran International Academy, the Ground Zero Mosque, and how the American Laws for American Courts initiative does (or may not) address this threat. As one of the most respected voices on this subject, I would also like to know how you came to dedicate your time to such issues, and how your involvement has evolved.
A bit more about me: I previously worked as a reporter for U.S. News & World Report, where I interviewed high-ranking officials ranging from former President Jimmy Carter to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Richard Myers. I have also written extensively for international publications, and my articles have been published and translated in publications around the world, including both in Europe and here in the United States. I have also spoken with David Horowitz and Robert Muise on this subject, both of whom were very helpful.
I understand, of course, that you may have reservations about speaking to a journalist (and a law student, to boot), but I would be more than happy to accommodate any concerns you may have.
Please feel free to contact me anytime via my information below.
Thanks, and best regards,
Andrew
There followed this exchange between Andrew Burt over just what he was after:
Spencer to Burt:
Thanks. In such an interview would I be cast as a “political extremist”?
Burt to Spencer:
Thanks for the quick response. I am attempting to understand the modern, so-called Anti-Sharia movement (whether or not that’s a fair term) — a movement that I believe, perhaps wrongly, is a type of political extremism, and one that I also understand you had an intimate hand in creating.
So in that sense, based on your connection to the movement, the answer may be yes. That being said, I am reaching out to you with the hopes that you will be able to provide insights into your thinking and the movement that I do not possess — and in that sense, I would do my best to give your thoughts as fair a viewing as possible.
If you are still willing, I would very much look forward to speaking.
Best,
Andrew
Now, I know that no less an authority than the British government of David Cameron has decreed that I am indeed an “extremist,” but since all my work is wholly and solely dedicated to the defense of the freedom of speech, the freedom of conscience, and the equality of rights of all people before the law, I respectfully take issue with Her Majesty’s Government’s characterization, which I believe to be politically motivated and manipulated by Islamic supremacist and hard-Left pressure groups that the Cameron government was afraid to anger. Since thirteen years of experience have shown me that mainstream media journalists are almost all far-Leftists with ethical standards just a notch above child molester (apologies to child molesters for comparing them to journalists), and because I don’t think defense of the principles enshrined in the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights to be “extremist,” I responded to Burt in this way:
Spencer to Burt:
Your bias shows from the beginning. There is nothing extremist about resisting jihad terror or Sharia violations of human rights. I am thus reluctant to meet or to be interviewed, as I doubt very seriously that I’d get a fair hearing or fair presentation.
However, Burt persisted, until finally I agreed to be interviewed via email.
Spencer to Burt:
Why don’t you:
1. Explain why you think I am an “extremist”; and
2. Send your questions to this email address.
Burt to Spencer:
In regards to your first question, to the extent that you appear to advocate that there is something uniquely suspicious, perhaps even evil, about Islam among all the other world religions, I believe that that is an extreme point of view.
To that I answered:
Spencer to Burt:
So you think all religious traditions are equally capable of inciting violence? Is that why we see so many Presbyterians shouting “Jesus is Lord” and blowing themselves up in crowds of Methodists?
In any case, even granting your characterization, which I do not actually accept, if I hold such an opinion I still advocate no illegal or unconstitutional or genuinely extreme remedies, but only the enforcement if existing laws. Hardly extreme, no?
And he sent these questions:
Burt to Spencer:
1. When did you begin to speak out against violent jihad? And what role did the terrorist attacks of 9/11 play in your thinking?
2. Are you familiar with the efforts of the Stop the Madrassa Coalition, beginning in 2007? If so, were you involved with the organization?
3. I understand that you and Pamela Geller created Stop Islamization of America (SIOA) in 2009. How did the organization come about?
4. Beginning in Tennessee, in May of 2010, a number of states began to ban Sharia law in the form of the American Laws for American Courts (ALAC) initiative. How have you been involved in promoting ALAC?
Spencer to Burt:
1. I began to speak out publicly against violent jihad right after 9/11. 9/11 did not change my thinking at all; I’ve been studying Islam since the early 1980s. However, after 9/11, I first began to do this work publicly.
2. Yes. No.
3. SIOA is an initiative of our organization, the American Freedom Defense Initiative (AFDI). This organization grew out of our common efforts, in which I aided in her work defending human rights, the freedom of speech, etc. Now that Egyptians and Tunisians in large numbers are rejecting Islamization explicitly, our SIOA name has been vindicated as referring to a rejection of the elements of Sharia that contradict accepted principles of human rights, and that millions of Muslims reject also.
4. I’ve written about such initiatives favorably. Here is one of those pieces: “The Necessity of Anti-Sharia Laws,” from the American Thinker, March 13, 2012: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/03/the_necessity_of_anti-sharia_laws.html
That same day (January 16), I sent Burt another email:
Spencer to Burt:
If you intend to send more questions, please answer these first:
1. Have you ever read the Qur’an? The Hadith (if so, which collections)? The Sharia compendium Reliance of the Traveller? If so, on what basis have you determined that it is “extremist” to think that the violent and supremacist aspects of Islamic teaching should be opposed?
2. What do you think of the many calls by Islamic jihadists and Muslim leaders to conquer the West and especially the U.S.? For example, Iran’s former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad himself once said: “Have no doubt… Allah willing, Islam will conquer what? It will conquer all the mountain tops of the world.” Sheik Ali Al-Faqir, former Jordanian minister of religious endowment, said this on Al-Aqsa TV on May 2, 2008: “We proclaim that we will conquer Rome, like Constantinople was conquered once…” Hamas MP and Islamic cleric Yunis Al-Astal said this, also on Al-Aqsa TV, on April 11, 2008: “Very soon, Allah willing, Rome will be conquered, just like Constantinople was, as was prophesized by our Prophet Muhammad.” Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the most prominent and renowned imam in the world, in writing about “signs of the victory of Islam,” said: “Islam will return to Europe as a conqueror and victor.” I could adduce hundreds of other examples. Are these people “extremists” of which you believe I am the non-Muslim equivalent? If so, how do you reconcile that with the fact that I have never called for conquest, murder, or denial of anyone’s Constitutional rights and human rights, and opposed the “nation-building” projects in Iraq and Afghanistan?
3. The Muslim Brotherhood has stated in its own words, according to a captured internal document, that its goal in the US is “eliminating and destroying Western civilization from within and sabotaging its miserable house…so that it is eliminated and Allah’s religion is made victorious over all other religions.” Are you including Muslim Brotherhood-linked groups such as the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) in your study of “extremist” groups in the US? If not, why not?
The next day, January 17, Burt sent me this response:
Thanks very much for your answers — I will address your questions before getting back to you with further questions from my end.
Andrew
It has been four days since then, and I have not heard again from Andrew Burt. To be sure, he is not writing an article, but a book, on “extremism,” and so presumably he has plenty of time to get back to me, and I await his answers. But I thought in the meantime, I’d throw the floor open to more questions for Andrew Burt. Journalists are forever analyzing and characterizing those whom they oppose and detest, dismissing foes of jihad terror as “bigots,” “extremists,” etc., without the slides on the microscope generally being given any chance to tell their side of the story.
But Mr. Burt was kind enough to answer my first question, the one about why he thinks I am an “extremist,” and I have every confidence that he will answer my follow-up questions as well. So let’s give him some more. Write in the comments field here your questions for Andrew Burt — about Islamic jihad, about “political extremism,” about Islam, about what kind of pizza he likes — whatever. And I will send them on to him with a respectful request for answers. Come on, “right-wing extremists”! Let’s hear from you!